Fairy Tail wizards have known tragedy in their lives but it didn't make this fateful day hurt any less.
Chapter 3: The Death Of Lisanna Strauss
Story by Hiro Mashima
Adapted Dialogue by Monica Rial and Clint Bickham
It was already an orange dusk in the skies when it had begun.
"Darkness Stream!" Mirajane bellowed, thrusting out her hand down towards the woodland.
The Beast knocked every tree in its way after getting back up and leaped into the air after the airborne She-Devil. However, a Magic Seal manifested beneath it before large tendrils sprouted from it like tree roots ironically. They began to surround the still airborne monster and began to bind its limbs all over. One even got around its neck.
"Suppression Arts!"
Mirajane clenched her teeth and her fists to enhance the strength of the tendrils but found herself magic starting to strain. What she hoped would be a few kicks and maybe a torn limb as a keepsake turned into a ten minute too long back-and-forth. The Beast seemed way too durable for his own good.
As if to prove this point yet again, the behemoth roared while straining to flex its muscles and torn off the tendrils. This send it back to the ground and create another crater of flatten trees among three or four others when it landing on its back.
"It's a boy alright," Mirajane panted heavily, wishing she handled shown her hand so early on. "Can't take a hint and stay down."
Just down below, Elfman punched a wide tree in his way to splinters with his Iron Bull Beast Arm and saw the Beast itself struggling to lift itself up this time. He glanced up to see a panting Mirajane's posture starting to slack with her wings flapping more slowly and knew that one false move could cost her.
"No more playing catch-up," Elfman declared to himself, turning his attention towards the rising Beast. "This calls for a specialist."
Mirajane was trying to figure out how to at least knock out the behemoth if only to tap out and rethink her strategy of "throw everything at the wall to see what sticks." However, that was derailed by the sight of Elfman bolting towards the Beast from her right hand side. Confusion and aghast finally hit her when he hugged the Beast's left wrist tight.
"Elfman!"
The Beast had recovered enough to feel the tight grip on its left wrist and immediately began trying to shake it off, pumping its fist violently. However, Elfman had managed to branch himself with his legs as well and was gritting his teeth. He concentrated on gathering all the magic that he could within him to make this gambit work.
"Don't play hard to get, buddy," Elfman grunted, beginning to glow brightly all over. "You and me are about to get more acquainted than you think."
The magic glow grew and extended itself across the Beast's right arm. Sure enough, the behemoth felt the power overwhelming him all over its body and roared in its attempt at resisting. Mirajane shielded her eyes from the brilliant radiance of her brother's Takeover Magic. Too brilliant.
"Elf, it's gonna overwhelm you!" Mira protested, hearing her brother grunt from the strain of it all. "Get outta there!
A vast pilgrimage of survivors poured out of the pathway through File Forest and arrived at the riverbank where the stone bridge big for two laid ahead. As Mayor Kamiya had estimated, there were cracks all across the structure including a few chunks that had fallen off completely. He had stepped forward in the crowd to see for himself.
"Doesn't seem too bad," Mayor Kamiya pondered, taking off his top hat. He tossed it over and let it glide onto the bridge like a frisbee to the crowd's confusion.
The second the hat touch the middle of the bridge, a huge mid-section crumbled and splashed into the river in but a second. Neither the Mayor nor his citizens spoke for a rather audible moment of silence with the faces falling in a collective wave of anxiousness. She had just flown down in her Bird Soul form after observing overhead for any dangers.
"'Too bad' no," Lisanna replied to Mayor Kamiya, hovering to his left, "'Far worse' is what I'd go with." She changed back to her human form in a flash on that far too honest note. "Good thing we brought the boats."
"Lot good they'll do us," a middle-aged woman in fishing gear called out. "The current is kickin' up a storm." Lisanna found Ms. Kari squatting down and putting her hand in the river to feel how strong the flow was.
"And none of the motor boats we've found got any SP plugs," the fisher's husband, Takeru, called out from behind, carrying a boat with his teenage son, Cody. "Even with oars, we'd get swept away before we made it across."
"Anymore bright ideas, furbait?" Kenny chided, oiling up behind Lisanna.
The young wizard found all eyes on her once again when she turned back to the survivors who were starting to get anxious again. Lisanna had considered a bad current but wasn't sure if it would work. All the same, she knew that they didn't need her to show doubt after how far they've came.
"I got a few," Lisanna retorted with a playful grin before glowing, literally working her magic already. "Takeover! Animal Soul!"
Kenny initially shielded his eyes from being up that close while Mayor Kamiya backed away wisely. The next thing he knew, the punk found himself being shoved backwards when Lisanna seemed to get... large? After falling on his butt, Kenny's jaw dropped at the sight of a giant purple bunny looming above him.
"Rabbit!" Lisanna giggled in her favorite transformation. "Anybody got a carrot craving?" She turned around to the now bewildered survivors and didn't waste time enjoying the view up there.
Mayor Kamiya found himself less than fazed by this point in what was a crazy day. However, several giggling children did surprise him when they ran past him and went up to see the giant rabbit.
"She's soooo cute!" a brown-haired girl squealed.
"She's soooooo fluffy!" a little blue-haired boy laughed, nuzzling up to Lisanna's foot.
"I want one!" a pink-haired girl cheered, wearing a rather big hat.
Lisanna was glad to see that this Takeover was a hit with the kids and leaned down to smile back at her newest fans. "Looks like I have a few volunteers already," she earnestly asserted, patting the brown-haired girl on the head. "I'll carry over the children before the adults so who wants to be first?"
A chorus of "I do!"s erupted across the little ones before Lisanna turned around to let five of them climb onto her back. All their crawling made her giggle with their tickles. One of the mothers stepped forth with a most worrisome look on her face and wasn't the only parent with her anxieties.
"You're not going to swim in that current, are you?" she nervously hoped aloud.
"Goodness no, ma'am" Lisanna chortled, turning around with two boys and three girls gripping hard onto her fur.
The adults collectively sighed with relief.
"The legs were made for hopping," Lisanna clarified matter-of-factly before squatting down.
The adults collectively had a proverbial heart attack when the giant, purple rabbit hopped high up in the air and started across the choppy waters. Many of the children cries out from joy, terror, excitement and all of the above along with Lisanna herself. It felt like a lifetime to everybody but she soon landed on the other side with a loud "BOOM!"
Lisanna kept her stance wide upon making landfall and let the children disembark, laughing along with them from the exhilaration. Truthfully, she was surprised that it even worked at all but wasn't about to let anybody catch on.
"I wanna go again!" pink-haired Mimi insisted hopping up and down.
"Now, now," Lisanna calmly claimed, patting her on the head like a big sister. "You need to be fair and everybody gets a turn."
"Okay..." Mimi pouted.
"But tell you what," Lisanna began, turning around to squat down. "Once your town is saved, we might be able to play together again."
"You promise?" blue-haired Keenan spoke up.
"I'd pinky-swear if I wasn't a carrot chewer," Lisanna promised before hopping strongly back to the other side. "But you can't hold me to it."
"Bye," the children called, smiling for the first time in what felt like forever.
Mirajane rubbed her eyes once the blinding flash died down and waited for her vision to return, not helped by the sun setting. The sight of the flatten trees came back into view once she looked down from the air and allowed her to spot Elfman. However, he was down on his right side with his limbs sprawled out.
"That idiot!" Mirajane cursed, barely holding back something stronger. "Elfman!" She hovered down quickly to the ground and changed out of her Satan Soul into her regular punk outfit before making a mad dash.
Elfman grunted in pain and rolled over onto his back just when Mirajane reached him from over every downed tree in her way. His coat had popped wide open with a few tears on his pant legs.
"C'mon," Mirajane begged, trying not to let her scowl drop in growing fear. "Don't do this to me..." She propped up his back by his shoulders and could see that his breathing had grown heavier.
"M... Mira..." Elfman grunted, struggling to speak and open his eyes. "I... I..."
"What is it?" Mirajane asked, her voice starting to tremble in fear.
BRAAAAPPP!
Mirajane recoiled from both the sound and smell of Elfman's burp. He managed to sit up just fine, pounding out the rest of the gas in his gut.
"...totally faked you out!" Elf couldn't help but snort, slowly standing back up. "Sorry but that Beast ate something too nasty to keep down."
Mirajane's frown of disgusted disbelief morphed into one of embarrassed exasperation. "You're lucky I'm too tired to kill you!" she declared, at least slugging him in the shoulder and getting him to grunt in pain. "You're more 'boy' than 'man,' man!"
"I'll take what I can get," Elfman grunted, rubbing his shoulder when he felt a growing throb of pain in his head. "Gah!" He winced while clenching his head and tried to endure the growing pain, hunching over.
"Oh-ho-ho-no you don't," Mirajane declared abrasively. "You're not getting a two-for-two on me."
"It's... not a bit," Elfman swore, gritting his teeth. "Something wrong with-AAAAAHHHHHHHH!" His screaming was paired with the same glow of a magical surge as before and a a greater pain that extended to the rest of his body. It felt a lot like his Beast Arm Takeover but it hurt.
"Oh, sh-" Mirajane nearly swore herself when she recognized the symptoms of a botch Takeover. "Elf, you gotta let it go before-"
However, her brother's deafening scream signified that it was too late before the glow grew brighter and his body grew bigger by the second. The sun fully set just as Elfman finally gave in.
"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" Kenny screamed while Lisanna made her twentieth jump over the river. "Stop the ride, I wanna get off!" It was a clear shot from the word "go" but going by his verbal mood, one would think that the purple bunny rabbit was making a swan dive for the current.
One lowkey "BOOM" later, Lisanna landed safely on the ground just a few feet shy of many other kids and adults she had flown over.
"Now what do you say, Mr. Bright Ideas?" she posited, cheekily calling back to Kenny's earlier quips.
"T-t-t-thank you..." he responded before letting his grip slip off completely. His body all but crumpled onto the ground after he slid off.
"Told you I had a few," Lisanna quipped back with her tongue sticking out. "Sleep tight." She made one more leap back across the river and landing just shy of Mayor Kamiya, the man now barely phased by the young lady's unique entrances.
"That's about all the kids, teens and elderly left," the mayor announced while Lisanna morphed back into her human form. "And the current seems to be settling down with the sun."
"I can still take the rest of you all over," Lisanna offered, gesturing to the still sizable amount of adults behind the Mayor. "Better safe than sorry."
"We can handle ourselves while you take a much needed break," Mr. Kari offered, carrying an oar over her shoulders. "Last thing we need is you running out of magic halfway across."
"So long as we don't underload, we only need to take it nice and slowly," Takeru promised Lisanna. "We're just glad that you got our kids across before the Beast came back."
Lisanna initially smiled at their offer before her eyes went wide at the realization. "The Beast!" she exclaimed. "Mira should've have beaten it by now but... where is she?" She darted across the crowd for any sign of her sister or Elfman.
"Um, well," Mayor Kamiya stammered, anxiously trying to keep the calm. "I'm sure she's resting off a well earned victory."
A distant but no less recognizable roar quashed any hopes that he had been attempting to muster. Most turned towards the source and saw a bright glow, one strong enough to be made out past the trees and the blazing Odaiba Village. The night sky certainly helped it stand out.
"This is gonna come up in election years, isn't it?" Mayor Kamiya dejectedly sighed, hanging his head like he paid for rotten fruit.
"Something bad just happened," Lisanna exclaimed, barely hiding her dread. "But I can't just leave-"
"No, go see to your siblings," Ms. Kari insisted, putting her hand on the young wizard's shoulder compassionately. "If you taught us anything, it's that there's always a chance if you take it."
Lisanna wanted to refuse but the look in the elderly fisher's eyes was too warm to refuse. "I'm coming back," she acquiesced. "I promise!" The young wizard stepped back to channel Magic throughout her body.
"Takeover, Animal Soul!" Lisanna belted out while her body morphed back into her feathered form. "Bird!" Flapping her wings, she took into the sky and hastily headed past the trees towards the roaring.
"Thanks," Mayor Kamiya sighed while seeing Lisanna off, looking oddly solemn. "My turn now."
Lisanna soared around the burning village of Odaiba to avoid the dense smoke gathering in the air. She considered herself lucky for this since she managed to catch sight of the Beast. It was slowly stomping into a rocky terrain amongst the forest just a mile past the railway tracks.
"Please, oh please, be alive," Lisanna begged to whom it might concern, flapping her wing to double time her flight.
She veered around to get behind the Beast and come in from above as silent as she could. Squinting with her sharp avian eyes, she managed to make out Mirajane battered with bruises and no longer employing her Satan Soul. That was a red flag if she ever saw one. Another popped up in the form of Elfman's disappearance.
"Elfman!" Mirajane cried out, clearly gritting her teeth from pain. "Pull yourself together!"
"Mira!" Lisanna cried out in fear for her big sister. She forgot to be too cautious while she dove downwards past the Beast and began to resume her human form.
"I had everyone in town evacuate!" Lisanna firmly promised, looking back at the behemoth with a brave knit brow. "Now let me help you!"
"You have to run, Lisanna," Mirajane grunted, clenching her sprained right arm. "It's dangerous."
The Beast continued to lumber towards their prey one footstomp at a time and at a brisk pace for his girth. A shadow overcast their body with only their violet eyes glowing in the night.
"I was getting beat up pretty bad so Elfman took over the Beast to protect me," Mirajane exposited, fudging the truth for Lisanna's sake. She couldn't be mad at Elfman. Not for now anyways.
"Oh my gosh..." Lisanna gasped in a whisper, her pupil receding over this fearful revelation. "That's him?!" The idea itself was hard to grasp when she looked up at the looming behemoth.
"It almost worked but the Beast was too powerful for him," Mirajane lamented, steadily her breathing. "Now he's totally lost control."
"Oh no..." Lisanna whispered, kneeling down to help Mirajane stand despite their mutual dread. "What do we do?" She put her sister's left arm over her shoulder and let her lean the best. "How can we save him?"
As if on cue, the Beast cast a huge shadow over the sisters and blocked the moonlight menacingly in its approach. Its own breath was so hot that steam poured out of it like the engine it had for a late lunch.
"We have to get him to come to his senses before the Beast complete takes over his soul," Mirajane explained, barely keeping herself up.
Lisanna's dread grew when she remembered one of Takeover Magic's dangerous drawbacks. A wizard biting off more they can chew would literally become what they eat. Her first instinct had been to get Mirajane and herself to safety before the Beast decided to make the first move.
However, Lisanna's second instinct reminded her that Elfman needed help now or never. It was a risk but the evacuation of Odaiba was fresh in her mind. If she could help an entire village get to safety, then her big brother would be a piece of cake. A smile grew upon her lips in tandem with a new found confidence in her heart.
Mirajane was wracking her brains for some sort of plan, any sort of plan, when Lisanna caught her off guard by letting go of her. She yelped upon losing her balance and falling to the rocky ground, only bracing herself with her arms. When Mira looked up, her eyes showed both bewilderment and fear upon seeing Lisanna walking up towards the Beast.
"What are you doing?!" Mirajane balked while clenching her bruised right arm. "Come back here!"
But Lisanna merely put one foot in front of the other slowly before stopping just shy of a yard from the looming behemoth. As if in recognition, the Beast stopped to glower down at whomever was foolhardy enough to approach it.
"Big brother Elf?" Lisanna called out softly, remembering how she called him years back. "You feeling okay?"
The Beast's grunts seemed to slow down in response.
"It's me, Lisanna, your little sister," the youngest Strauss went on, rubbing her left elbow in slight anxiousness. "Our big sister, Mira, is here too."
The Beast cocked his head a tad, seeming to process Lisanna's words. Just maybe...
"We're a family," Lisanna went on, her smile becoming a touch sheepish, "and when times are tough, we pull together and work things out." She breathed deeply a bit to calm herself more. "So why don't the three of us go home and talk about what happened today?"
The Beast's eyes narrowed as if disturbed or in an attempt to focus.
"I promise we're no mad at you," Lisanna continued, becoming confident in this de-escalation.
The Beast let out a roar and rose its right hand. Mirajane clenched her teeth tensely but could tell that the tone was a conflicted one. Maybe... Elfman was in there... and winning. She didn't dare jump in too soon when Lisanna seemed to know what she was doing.
"C'mon," young Strauss offered, opening her arm to show she was defenseless. "Don't be afraid, big brother." The roar barely fazed her in her belief that she was getting through to the headstrong, big-hearted Elfman that she knew and loved.
"We still love you."
The Beast brought its right hand down... and swung it across the ground to smack Lisanna Strauss with little to no restraint whatsoever. The force of a runaway freight train down a steep hill stuck her within half a second and sent her flying, kicking up a major gust in the process.
Mirajane let out a tear-filled scream but barely heard it with her focus consumed by the sight of her little sister being catapulted through the air. Lisanna's limbs were listless as a rag-doll before she landed amongst the tree just shy of another set of cliffs. Almost immediately, Mira forgot to be battered and made a mad sprint in that direction.
"Not her!" she repeated to herself over and over, passing every tree with a new tear to shed. "Please not her!"
Lisanna: Beloved sister and friend to animal souls. However, as one door closes, another opens up. Just not the door you might be expecting.
Thank you for reading so far. Please leave a comment as to how you enjoyed this story so far.
